Eating Insects Will Help Feed Hungry World, UN Says

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NEW YORK — The problem is familiar: How to feed a growing world
population. Now, a few people have offered a solution that may
sound strange, at least to Western ears: Eat insects.

Now, the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization has
weighed
in favor of entomophagy, the practice of eating insects. In a
200-plus-page report issued in May, the FAO provides the first
comprehensive assessment of insects' current and potential uses
food for humans and livestock.

"It is widely accepted that by 2050 the world will host 9 billion
people. To accommodate this number, current food production will
need to almost double," reads the report, titled "Edible Insects:
Future Prospects for Food and Feed Security." "We need to find
new ways of growing food." [ Crowded
Planet: 7 (Billion) Population Milestones ]

Entomophagy has picked up momentum over the years, Louis Sorkin,
an entomologist at the American Museum of Natural History in New
York City, and a proponent of bug eating told an audience on
Wednesday (June 26) night here at the New York Academy of
Sciences.

The FAO
report, as well as books published over the past 20 years
featuring
appealing insect recipes and photos, have been a part of the
greater acceptance of bug-eating, Sorkin said. "You have to get
people to, I guess, swallow it here in the Western part of the
world," he told LiveScience.

Although many Westerners may react to the idea of bug-eating with
disgust, insects make up a part of the traditional diets of about
2 billion people, the report estimates. These include the larvae
of the palm weevil, a type of beetle, in a number of tropical
regions; mopane worms in southern Africa; yellow jacket wasp
larvae in Japan; and grasshoppers known as chapulines in Oaxaca,
Mexico, to name a few.

"I happen to like more the immature beetles, the grubs. They're
softer," Sorkin said. "They don't have the exoskeleton and they
are more flavorful, but to each his own."

Insects offer a clear environmental benefit, because they can
convert their own food to body mass more efficiently than
traditional livestock, because, unlike chickens, pigs and cows,
insects are not warm-blooded, Sorkin said. As a result, they do
not have to expend energy to keep themselves warm and can use it
to grow instead.

Among other benefits, insects take up little space, can be raised
on waste, and research indicates they emit
fewer greenhouse gases than conventional livestock, according
to the report.

They can be nutritious, with high fat, protein, vitamin, fiber
and mineral content, although the nutritional value varies among
species, the report says.

But for Westerners, entomophagy may require disguising dinner.

"I think most people here probably don't like to eat insects,
because they look like insects. But if you cook the insects, dry
the insects and grind them into a flour, more people would
consume it," Sorkin said.

One company, Utah-based Chapul, has taken this approach and sells
energy bars made of cricket flour.

Humans aren't the only ones who could stand to eat more insects.
Research is exploring using insect protein to feed farmed fish
and poultry, the report says.